Avatar of Boris

Avatar of Boris is the Spring 2012 special challenge path, introduced on February 15, 2012. Players may select this path in Valhalla, instead of a dietary challenge path. Its description in The Bureau of Reincarnation reads, "You're filled with the spirit of Boris, the voracious, ferocious, and prestigious Legendary Warrior of the Times of Old. Armed with only your trusty axe Trusty and your faithful minstrel Clancy, you'll use an entirely new set of skills to defeat the Sorceress."

During an Avatar of Boris run, players are given a unique set of equipment and skills, along with a companion in place of the standard familiars. Boris's (and therefore, your) feasting is the stuff of legend, but his (and your) alcohol tolerance is very poor.

No access to familiars. Attempting to equip a familiar or place one in the Crown of Thrones yields the following message: Boris has no need for familiars!

Your minstrel Clancy will perform functions similar to a familiar and will change functionality depending on what he has equipped. His initial equipment will make him restore HP and MP post-fight (similarly to a Ghuol Whelp, but 100% of the time).

Cannot use familiar hatchlings. Attempting to do so yields the following message: Boris has no need for familiars.

Skills

No access to any non-Avatar skills.

Skills gained outside the guild trainer, such as Gnome skills or Spookyraven skills, can be obtained as usual, but any previously permed are still unavailable unless obtained in-run. For obtaining a Spookyraven skill, the Avatar of Boris acts as a Seal Clubber.

On the Feast of Boris, despite being a holiday dedicated to you, you do not gain additional stomach capacity, just like other challenge paths. The wandering monsters also only drop the lower-level food.

Class

Rather than playing any of the traditional 6 classes, you will play as an Avatar of Boris with entirely different skills.

You will not be accepted into any of the traditional guilds. You will not be able to use a guild to unlock any quests or areas.

Boris didn't want to belong to any organizations that would have him as a member. Of course, given his history of violence and tendency to eat everything he saw, almost no organization would have him as a member, so it didn't come up very often.

Upon breaking the prism, you will lose the Boris path, and be asked to choose one of the original classes to play until you ascend again. Your stats will be switched to fit the new class. You will lose Trusty and Clancy, and your Stomach and Liver capacities will be set to their standard values (15/14 respectively, or 20/14 if you have Stomach of Steel).

Skills

Rather than purchasing new skills for meat, you may revel in Boris's glory at Boris's Gate. You may learn skills from 3 trees: Fighting, Shouting, and Feasting. Each skill you learn costs one skill point, regardless of rank.

You begin with 1 skill point, plus 1 point for each normal (softcore) Avatar of Boris ascension completed, and 2 points for each hardcore Avatar of Boris ascension completed. (This means that on your first AoB run, you'll only start with 1 skill point.) You gain 1 additional skill point each time you level up, up to level 15.

Since you only gain skill points up to level 15, if you want more than 15 skills, you must ascend repeatedly for bonus starting points.

You cannot skip ranks within a skill tree. In order to learn a 3rd-rank skill, you must first learn the 1st-rank and 2nd-rank skills from that same tree.

You can have only one song effect active at a time. Singing a different song will remove the first one automatically.

Clancy

Clancy can level up, but he does not gain weight like other familiars. Effects that increase familiar weight have no effect on him. He gains a level by encountering special path-specific noncombat adventures, and some skills can also increase Clancy's level (eg More to Love).

Clancy's effects depend on which instrument he is using. New instruments may be found in various places; using one causes him to swap to it, changing his avatar, and giving you back the previous instrument.

Strategy

Rewards

If this is your first run as the Avatar of Boris, opening the letter from King Ralph XI unlocks a new class tattoo. There is also a sparkly tattoo available upon completion of a hardcore run as an Avatar of Boris.

Learning all Boris skills (which requires a minimum of 15 extra Boris points at the start of the run) will grant a Note from Clancy after ascending, which grants Request Sandwich.

Reaching Level 30 as an Avatar of Boris makes you eligible for the And My Axetrophy.

Freeing the King, or dropping Avatar of Boris, will make you ineligible for the trophy.

History

Somewhere around the beginning of September 2012, Avatars of Boris became unable to enter The Sea. Prior to this, they could talk to the Old Man and enter normally. This caused some glitches:

When obtaining a Sea skill, you were treated as a Turtle Tamer.

If you broke the prism and changed class after entering the Sea but before finishing all of the Sea quests (little brother, big brother, grandpa + skill, grandma), you were unable to proceed with any of them. This broken state persisted until you ascended.